EXPERIENCE, course knowledge and good form – they were the telling factors as Mark Windsor took out the open men’s 2018 Western Division Individual Time Trial Championship on the weekend.
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Windsor covered the 15 kilometre course in 21 minutes, 12 seconds – 14 seconds quicker than runner-up Brad Rayner while Richard Hobson placed third.
The event, which doubled as a round of the Bathurst Cycling Club’s road series and individual time trial championship, was held on a “fast and flat” course which Windsor has tackled on numerous occasions.
“It's about the 18th time we’ve used that course for the Bathurst championship. It was incredibly cold and windy so it was so slow, it was one of the slowest years we’ve had,” he said.
“[But] I’m pretty happy about winning those things … there are plenty of excellent riders on that honour roll. I first got on that Western podium in the mid to early 80s, so it’s a pretty long old run actually, I’m pretty proud of that to be honest.”
Windsor said his goal was to match the splits of Rayner and defending champion Hobson early before upping his tempo.
“I’ve always been able to do it, if you’ve got the experience you just know that spot that you can hit and find that little bit extra. It’s not a fluke that the people with time trial experience come through in those championships,” he said.
“There’s no doubt Brad is going very well, he’s leading our road series at the moment. So I knew if I could just stay with him in the middle section – in the middle section there wasn’t much between the three of us – but I thought with my experience in the last bit I should be able to push it and get in.”
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Just as Windsor was pleased to claim his second time trial victory in two years, he was delighted to see Bathurst’s Jille Harris (26:09) win the female honours as she finished just under four seconds quicker than Kalinda Robinson.
“Jille is a good time trialler, she has won medals at the state level in the age groups but in recent years Toireasa [Gallagher], Jodie Martin and Kirsten [Howard] have dominated, the last 10 years or so she hasn’t got a look in,” Windsor said.
“It was good to see her finally crack one, she well and truly deserved it. With her time trialling ability it was nice to see her get on that honour roll.”
In the battle for B grade honours David Reece (23:58) held off classy junior Luke Tuckwell and Jono Cutler, while Lithgow’s Graham Stait (25:01) was crowned Western’s C grade champion ahead of Rob Stephen and Neville Krahe.
Bathurst’s Caroline Robinson (27:38) made to back-to-back Western D grade time trial titles, nudging out club-mate Rosemary Hasting and Norm Wise.